The Johanneswasserfall is the family walk with a proper finale: an hour of easy trail from the Gnadenalm huts, then about 200 steps and a secured path that leads right behind a 60-metre curtain of falling water.
Why go
Most waterfalls you look at. This one you walk through — or rather behind. At about 1,390 m the Nördliche Taurach — the Pongau Taurach, which rises at the Tauern pass — takes its first big step down the valley here, dropping some 60 m over a rock overhang, and a railed path runs along the wall underneath it, so you stand in the spray with the whole forested valley framed by the water in front of you. Archduke Johann of Austria was impressed enough on a visit in the early 19th century to have the first railing built, which is how the fall got its name; it has been a protected natural monument since 1931.
The approach matters as much as the finale for families. From the free car park at Gnadenalm the “Alles Alm” experience trail — themed stations about alpine pasture life, cows, milk, honey, wood and water, with playground stops — reaches the fall in about an hour at family pace. Shortly before the alm huts, a signpost sends you left to the waterfall. From our hike, the pastures with grazing cows and the sound of the water getting louder kept the kids moving, and the passage behind the fall was the reward that made the whole walk feel earned.
Good to know
- Allow about an hour each way from Gnadenalm, or 2–2½ hours for the loop; from the Gnadenalm car park the trail is stroller-friendly until the final stretch to the fall.
- Shorter option: start from the alm huts near the fall, or from the small lay-by on the Tauern pass road (B99) just above it, where roughly 200 steps lead straight down to the curtain.
- The steps and the path behind the fall are wet and slippery — shoes with grip, a hand for small children, and a light rain jacket if you want to stand in the spray for long.
- The waterfall lies on the Pongau side of the Tauern pass in the municipality of Untertauern, a few minutes below Obertauern; it is over the pass from Lungau, about 30 minutes from Mariapfarr.
- Free to visit; dogs on a leash. Sunny mornings light the curtain best. Current trail and hut details are on the Gnadenalm operator’s page.
- In winter the fall freezes into an ice spectacle, but the path behind it is a snow-free-season walk — this is a summer and autumn outing.
